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AuthorBokenham, Osbern; Delany, Sheila
Category: Church
This volume begins with the ministry of the apostle John and the writing of the Fourth Gospel. It continues with the great evangelistic bishops of the early church – Ignatius, Polycarp, Irenaeus; early defenders of the faith such as Justin and Origen; and many of the early martyrs such as Perpetua of Carthage. As more and more converts were discovered in the army, imperial bureaucracy and general population, Roman emperors and governors increasingly saw the new religion as rebellion against the state. They required suspected Christians to burn incense to the divinity of the emperor. Thousands refused and were savagely put to death – torn apart by lions or wild bulls in arenas for sport, crucified along roadsides, or tortured to death in dungeons. Far from destroying the church, however, the courageous deaths of the martyrs drew even more converts.
AuthorChristian History Project
Year Published2002
Series NameThe Christians #2: Their first two thousand years
Category: Church
Rome’s bloody anti-Christian persecutions now reached their worst stage ever, first under Decius and then Diocletian. Then a new and very different emperor emerged. Before the key battle that brought him to power, Constantine had seen the sign of a cross in the sky, and received the message “By this sign, conquer.” He imposed peace and religious tolerance across the empire. No longer subversives, Christians suddenly became the new establishment. This opened very different and dangerous challenges for the church. The first was an influx of opportunistic converts seeking not salvation but worldly power. Even worse was a growing controversy over whether Jesus is God, and if so, in what sense? It came to a head, but not to resolution, at the great Council of Nicea.
AuthorChristian History Project
Year Published2003
Series NameThe Christians #3: Their first two thousand years
Category: Church
AuthorSchoolland, Marian M.
Category: Church
Contributions from a conference sponsored by the Institute for Christian Studies in 1988.
AuthorVanderVennen, Robert E.
Year Published1991
Category: Church
In the fourth century one man – Athanasius – saved Christianity from near-destruction by a surge of “Arianism,” a heresy denying the divinity of Christ. The story of Christianity then shifts to the complete destruction of the western Roman empire by successive hordes of barbarians invading from forests and steppes to the north and east. In many ways the equivalent of an all-out nuclear war, this catastrophe brought to an end the ancient world, and ushered in the beginnings of medieval Christendom. There are chapters on Augustine, Patrick and the Irish reconversion of barbarian Europe, the kingdom of the formidable Franks, and the founding of the Byzantine Christian empire in the East.
AuthorChristian History Project
Year Published2003
Series NameThe Christians #4: Their first two thousand years
Category: Church
Published to celebrate the 150th Anniversary of the Christian Reformed Church in 2007, this book is an overview of the CRC’s history, particularly the past 50 years, as well as a peek ahead.
AuthorHoezee, Scott
Year Published2006
Category: Church
AuthorFirst Christian Reformed Church History Book Committee
Year Published1985